It’s 1492. And You’re Columbus.
A couple of years ago, Silicon Valley techies created a whole new world.
Like the old New World, explorers quickly appeared. Some took plots of land and settled them; some built homes like they had in the Old World; some, more ambitious, built entire cities. Commerce came, and with it more settlers. Writers and entertainers moved in. And as the population grew, banks and other big business interests began paying attention.
This world’s currency has had its ups and downs, but if you invested in it a few weeks ago, you’d be a happy person; its value is climbing steeply against the dollar as I write this.
The catch? This world exists entirely in virtuality. It’s called Second Life.
Second Life isn’t a game, but a resident-built virtual community. Every piece of land was bought and maintained by real people. Every structure you see was built by real participants. And every wild costume you see has a designer, who was probably paid handsomely for their services.
And Second Life is growing like mad. When I joined in April, there were about 130,000 residents. July was 400,000. Today is pushing 600,000.
My prediction: this is the MySpace of the next five years. And much, much more. Consider this:
- Major brands are moving in: Amazon, Adidas, Scion, and more
- A PR firm has moved in
- There are people making their living entirely within this world—already
- Some of the most successful building design firms are architects in real life
- There’s a startup exploring ways to make cubicle-work more interesting by doing it in virtuality
And can you imagine a better place to host virtual business meetings, to build virtual factories, to experiment with architecture before committing in real life, to get your start in programming and 3D modeling, to show monumental art projects, to re-create real-world terrain for big project proposals, or to serve as a training ground for commerce and interaction in the real world? The possibilities are mind-blowing already.
And consider the future. Someone just has to work out the body language and voice communications problem, and we’re looking at something that will change the world.
So what are we doing about it? Our office in Second Life will be open before the end of the year. We have some client work already in process. And some really, really exciting things we can’t talk about yet. But we’ll keep you posted.
So go ahead. Jump in. Explore. Build things. Meet people. And think, “Wow, this is a whole new world.”
